Intergenerational Cycles Of Trauma And Violence An Attachment And Family Systems Perspective

Exploring the conditions under which children, as a function of their own abuse, become abusive themselves. That experiences from childhood affect our behavior in adulthood, especially in the ways we treat our children and intimate partners, is generally accepted. Indeed, theories of intergenerational transmission of violence indicate that if we ourselves have been abused and neglected as children, we will likely be abusive and neglectful to others close to us—thus extending the cycle across generations. However, many individuals who were maltreated as children do not replicate this cycle, and such models make little sense of the individual raised in a “good family” who is violent either as a child or as an adult. These discontinuities of cycles of violence and trauma have challenged professionals and nonprofessionals alike. However, broadening our vision and attending to new areas of research can help to illuminate this conundrum and open up new avenues of intervention. In this book, Pamela Alexander does just that. She proposes that an increased risk for abusive behavior or revictimization, as a function of one’s own experiences of abuse or trauma in childhood, can best be understood through the complementary lenses of attachment theory (focusing on the relationship between the child and the caregiver) and family systems theory (focusing on the larger context of this relationship). That is, what a child acquires from her relationship with a caregiver is not simply a reflection of what she has “learned” from experiencing or witnessing abuse. Rather, it emerges from the child’s felt experience of the relationship itself—on implicit emotional, physical, and neurobiological levels. Alexander founds the book on this multifaceted parent–child attachment relationship and its place in the wider family system, integrating clinical experience with close attention to the long-term neurobiological and epigenetic effects of trauma. She focuses on common outcomes of a history of maltreatment, and of child sexual abuse in particular, including peer victimization, partner violence, parenting problems, and sexual offending. A detailed review of the literature accompanies instructive case examples. Sources of trauma from outside the family, including combat exposure, political terrorism, foster care, and incarceration of parents are considered. Finally, Alexander analyzes the multiple sources of natural resilience—the neurobiological, the individual, the relational, and the social—to enable professionals of all backgrounds to tailor-make effective interventions for interrupting cycles of trauma and violence.

***The Instant National Bestseller*** A Next Big Idea Club must-read title for January 2024 The definitive, paradigm-shifting guide to healing intergenerational trauma—weaving together scientific research with practical exercises and stories from the therapy room—from Dr. Mariel Buqué, PhD, a Columbia University–trained trauma-informed psychologist and practitioner of holistic healing From Dr. Mariel Buqué, a leading trauma psychologist, comes this groundbreaking guide to transforming intergenerational pain into intergenerational abundance. With Break the Cycle, she delivers the definitive guide to healing inherited trauma. Weaving together scientific research with practical exercises and stories from the therapy room, Dr. Buqué teaches readers how trauma is transmitted from one generation to the next and how they can break the cycle through tangible therapeutic practices, learning to pass down strength instead of pain to future generations. When a physical wound is left unhealed, it continues to cause pain and can infect the whole body. When emotions are left unhealed, they similarly cause harm that spreads to other parts of our lives, hurting our family, friends, community members, and others. Eventually, this hurt can injure an entire lineage, metastasizing across years and generations. This is intergenerational trauma. This trauma is why some of us become estranged from our families, why some of us are people pleasers, why some of us find ourselves in codependent relationships. This trauma can be rooted in the experiences of ancestors, who may have suffered due to unhealthy family dynamics, and it can be collective, the result of a shared experience like systemic oppression, or harmful ingrained behaviors in a culture like the acceptance of physical discipline of children, or even a natural disaster like a pandemic. These wounds are complex, impacting our minds, bodies, and spirits. Healing requires a holistic approach that has so far been absent from the field of psychology. Until now.

Trauma can result in a variety of symptoms and problems such as behavioral disorders, emotional dysregulation, sleep disturbances, recurring nightmares, intrusive thoughts, and learning and academic challenges. Children and adolescents who have posttraumatic stress disorder are usually presented to therapists in one of four clinical situations: (1) the traumatized child and parents request trauma-focused therapy, (2) the child with trauma history refuses treatment, (3) a parent is impaired by their own trauma history but does not want to receive treatment, (4) a child has experienced trauma but the parent wants to focus on a behavioral issue and symptoms rather than the trauma. Family Therapy for Treating Trauma offers a stand-alone family therapy approach for trauma survivors and provides a cross-culturally competent family treatment framework for working with trauma. It outlines both how to assess family patterns that reinforce or exacerbate effects of trauma and how to mobilize the healing power of family relationships to moderate or resolve effects of trauma. Via an integrative approach, the book offers flexible ways to adapt to client choices so as to enhance difficult to engage clients and families. It serves as a resource for professional audiences and can be offered as a text for courses on both family therapy and trauma treatment.

This authoritative reference on complex traumatic stress disorders (CTSDs) and their assessment and treatment has now been significantly revised with more than 75% new material reflecting a decade of advances in the field. Leading experts delve into ways to understand, engage, assess, and treat adults with complex trauma histories, whose symptoms often include but may go well beyond those of posttraumatic stress disorder. The volume presents cutting-edge theory and research on CTSDs, considers diagnostic controversies, and identifies core elements of effective, culturally responsive treatment. Established and emerging therapies specifically tailored to this population are described and illustrated with vivid case examples. Other highlights are chapters on transtheoretical treatment, the crucial role of professionalism and training, and recognizing and managing vicarious traumatization. New to This Edition *Incorporates major advances in research and clinical practice. *Chapters on additional evidence-based individual treatments: prolonged exposure therapy, cognitive therapy, cognitive processing therapy, brief eclectic psychotherapy, eye movement desensitization and reprocessing therapy, narrative exposure therapy, interpersonal psychotherapy, emotion-focused therapy, and the TARGET recovery model. *Chapters on additional evidence-based group and conjoint family therapy models: attachment-based couple therapy and integrated treatment of co-occurring CTSDs and substance use disorders. *Chapters on promising treatments: treatment for structural dissociation, experiential/somatotherapy approaches, mindfulness approaches, and complementary healing therapies. See also Drs. Ford and Courtois's authored book, Treatment of Complex Trauma, which presents their own therapeutic approach for adult clients in depth, and their edited volume Treating Complex Traumatic Stress Disorders in Children and Adolescents.

Christianity Today 2019 Book of the Year Award, Politics and Public Life Across the globe, acts of violence against women produce more deaths, disability, and mutilation than cancer, malaria, and traffic accidents combined. The truth is that violence on such a scale could not exist were it not structured in some way into the very fabric of societies and cultures themselves. It could not continue if it were not somehow supported by deep assumptions about the value of women, or some justification of the use of power. In many cultures such assumptions are reiterated every day in the absence of legal protection for women, or indifference toward issues of human rights. In Scars Across Humanity, Elaine Storkey offers a rigorously researched overview of this global pandemic. From female infanticide and child brides to domestic abuse, prostitution, rape, and honor killings, violence against women occurs at all stages of life, and in all cultures and societies. How and why has this violence become so prevalent? It seems ambitious to hope that we can find an answer to this question, but if violence to women is ever to be eliminated, we need to know what we are up against.

IF YOU ARE A PARENT, SCHOOLTEACHER, LAW ENFORCEMENT OFFICER, or mental healthcare provider, Toxic Families, Violent Lives lays out what you need to know about what is causing heightened levels of childhood/adolescent mental illness, behavioral disorders, juvenile alcohol and substance abuse, gang membership, school dropouts, teen pregnancies, and pervasive crime and violence. Toxic Families, Violent Lives gets at the root of the problem. It's all about the impediments to healthy childhood/adolescent physical, psychological, emotional, intellectual, and moral development. This book identifies a range of adverse childhood experiences that are the direct result of toxic family life rooted in poor parenting practices, and a range of dysfunctional and problematic parent behavior stemming from adult mental illness, alcohol and substance abuse, obsessions, insecurities, depression, anxiety, and maladaptive coping mechanisms. Parents need to understand the importance of developing a parent-child attachment, and a child’s self-control, empathy, and moral foundation. What can parents, schoolteachers, law enforcement, and mental health professionals do? Understand the pathways and pitfalls to healthy childhood / adolescent development and take an active role in that process. This book takes a read it, understand it, and apply it approach to the problem.

The life stories of Roma Pentecostals in Croatia and Serbia reveal both significant hardship and resilience, which notably impacts how they incorporate a Pentecostal identity and the ways in which they transform their daily lives in accordance with Pentecostal theology.